672 Seth Godin — The Pursuit of Meaning, The Life-Changing Power of Choosing Your Attitude, Overcoming Rejection, Life Lessons from Zig Ziglar, and Committing to Making Positive Change
This is a OPEN AI summary of the Tim Ferriss Podcast #672- visit www.TinyTim.blog for more AI summaries, or www.Tim.blog for the official Tim Ferriss Podcasts.
In this episode, Tim Ferriss interviews Seth Godin, author of 21 international bestsellers. They discuss Seth's new book, The Song of Significance: A New Manifesto for Teams. Seth shares his insights on marketing, social media, and entrepreneurship.
Seth Godin reflects on aging and how it can be easy to feel like one is fading away as the world changes and younger people take the spotlight. He shares an analogy of how he learned to ski later in life and had to confront his fears, which he says is something everyone will have to do as they age.
Seth Godin discusses how boomers are reaching the end of their lives, and how this is causing a lot of anxiety for people. He argues that we should focus on what we have, rather than what we've lost.
Seth Godin and Tim Ferriss discuss the importance of choosing one's attitude, even in the face of difficult circumstances. They mention Viktor Frankl as an example of someone who chose to see the positive even in the midst of great hardship.
Viktor Frankl's story of surviving four concentration camps is powerful and inspiring. His work in suicide prevention was extraordinary, as he understood that many people need to find a path toward hope and meaning in order to improve their lives. In our current culture, people are recognizing the importance of finding something to care about, rather than just acquiring more stuff.
The Carbon Almanac is a community of people committed to fighting climate change. They are all volunteers who are not in it for the money. They are happy and engaged in life because of the meaning they get from the community.
In 150 days, a group of 300 volunteers from around the world created a 97,000-word book with no errors, all as volunteers around the world, 24 hours a day, trading shifts. The process of building the book provided solace for the volunteers and taught them a lot about what a community can do when people are enrolled.
Seth Godin speaks to how he thinks about nihilism and addressing nihilism. He believes that the best way to deal with the creeping nihilism that many people are feeling is to take action and do something, rather than just sitting around and waiting for things to happen.
The Last Policeman is a book about a police officer in a small village who is trying to solve a crime while also dealing with the fact that an asteroid is going to hit the Earth and kill everyone in a year. The book explores the idea of what people would do if they knew they were going to die soon.
Some people believe that the purpose of business is to enable culture, while others believe that the purpose of culture is to enable business. Milton Friedman argued that the only purpose of a corporation is to maximize profit. However, this view lets people off the hook and ignores the damage that businesses can do. For example, high turnover rates at Amazon warehouses cost the company a third of its profit. This is because workers are treated like machines and are not given any respect. Despite all the damage that has been done, we still live in a miraculous world where we have access to technology and information.
In this clip, Tim Ferriss and Seth Godin discuss the importance of finding meaning in our work. Godin argues that significance comes from making a change happen, and that we can only find true significance by being clear about the change we seek to make and who we are making it with and for.
The myth of the carbon footprint is that there is nothing you can do as an individual to fix the climate. However, you can band together with others to make a difference. Additionally, you can make a difference in your own life by making sure that your work is significant and that you are doing something that you are passionate about.
In this interview, Tim Ferriss talks to Seth Godin about how to find work that is unmistakably us and how to become a marketer. Godin says that the best way to become a marketer is to find a charity that you care about and raise $10,000 for them.
In order to create meaning in one's work and avoid becoming replaceable, it is important to focus on connecting with others in a way that makes them feel better. This can be done by simply taking the time to interact with them and listen to their needs.
Seth Godin discusses the importance of optimism and taking action in order to achieve goals. He argues that too often, people allow themselves to be limited by their circumstances, when in reality they have more agency than they realize. Godin urges people to take risks and do something that matters, rather than simply following the norms.
In this conversation, Tim Ferriss and Seth Godin discuss the bees and their fascinating story. Jacqueline Freemans Song of Increase is a great example of how a typical hive can make it through a long winter. The council of maidens helps the bees to survive and thrive.
Bees are fascinating creatures who work together to keep their hive running smoothly. In May and June, the worker bees will build a vertical egg chamber and replenish the honey supply. Then, 12,000 bees will leave the hive in search of a new place to live. Each bee has a specific job to do in order to ensure the success of the hive.
Seth Godin nearly drowned while swimming, but the experience inspired him to write a book in honor of his friends who had passed away. He wrote the book in two weeks and it is about significance, power, and how to make a difference in the world.
In this excerpt, Tim Ferriss and Seth Godin discuss the origins of surveillance capitalism and its effects on workers. Godin argues that the conditions of surveillance capitalism, including solitary confinement and constant surveillance, lead to high turnover and low work satisfaction.
Tim Ferriss and Seth Godin discuss the importance of treating employees as people, not just resources. They argue that this is essential for creating a successful business.
The Carbon Almanac team is focused on creating change, and they believe that freelancers can play a big role in making this happen. They advise that freelancers should strip away the busy work, outsource it, and get better clients who will demand better work and pay more.
Seth Godin and Tim Ferriss discuss the importance of setting and achieving goals. Godin talks about how he was wrong about his first impression of Ferriss, and how Ferriss is very good at being aware of his own assumptions and constraints. Ferriss talks about how he chooses the rules for his life, and how money is just a story.
Seth Godin compliments Tim Ferriss on his success, saying that he has developed a strong voice and platform faster than almost anyone Godin has worked with. He attributes this success to Ferriss's willingness to seize opportunities as they arise.
In this excerpt, Seth Godin and Tim Ferriss discuss the importance of proxies in our lives. Proxies are a way for us to make decisions without having all the information. For example, we use proxies when we go shopping at the supermarket or when we pick a restaurant to go to. We use proxies to judge a book by its cover. However, sometimes we can develop false proxies.
We should focus on the work someone has done, not on proxies like where they went to school or whether they're good at interviewing. False proxies lead to caste systems and social stratification. The simple solution is to only work with people we've worked with before.
Seth Godin discusses the importance of working with people you've worked with before. He argues that the old way of hiring people based on their proxies (e.g. their resume) is not effective. Instead, he suggests that we should seek out people who we've seen do good work in the past and offer them the project.
The purpose of a company town is to make it harder for employees to quit. The goal of the old school industrialist is to make it so that your employees have no options, because if they have no options, you don't have to pay them very much.
The article discusses the importance of creating a company culture that encourages employees to stay with the company. It also talks about the importance of onboarding new employees quickly and efficiently.
Mahan Khalsa's book, "Lets Get Real or Lets Not Play", is about B2B selling. The lesson of the book is that salespeople need to be honest with their prospects and make promises that they can keep. If a salesperson is not honest, they are wasting their time and the prospect's time.
Seth Godin and Zig Ziglar disagreed about astrology and yoga, among other things. However, they respected each other's positions and remained friends.
Zig Ziglar was a motivational speaker who encouraged self-interested people to help others in order to get ahead in life. He believed that doing favors for others would open the door to making sales. Over time, Seth Godin learned from Ziglar and became a professional speaker himself. He suggests that people listen to Ziglar's stories in order to become motivated and not quit.
Seth Godin discusses his journey in the book business, from working with well-known authors to struggling to get his own work published. He talks about how difficult it can be to keep going when rejections pile up, but how important it is to keep trying. Tim Ferriss asks about Godin's approach to building a community orchestra, and Godin talks about how he is approaching it.
Seth Godin talks about how he has always been known for being reliable and meeting deadlines, and how this has both good and bad aspects. He reflects on how his career has changed pace in recent years, and how this has affected his ability to create a sense of community.
Seth Godin tells the story of how he found a Piano at the B conference and used it as a shtick to get started with his talk. He talks about how the piano was built in 1884 and how it is still working and creating magic 140 years later.
Seth Godin and Tim Ferriss discuss the importance of meetings, and how Zoom and memos have revolutionized the way we connect with people. Godin argues that meetings are a waste of time unless they are absolutely necessary, and that video is the best way to connect with people as it eliminates geography and time constraints.
The speaker argues that meetings are a waste of time and that conversations are a better way to exchange information. He cites Matt Mullenweg of Automattic as an example of someone who has successfully built a distributed organization without relying on meetings.
Seth Godin and Tim Ferriss discuss the ChatGPT tool for blogs, which allows users to create a talking llama character. They also talk about the page 19 thinking tactic, which is a way to get team members to work on something without feeling like they have to be qualified.
Seth Godin discusses how embracing "page 19 thinking" can help people become more innovative and successful. He explains that this way of thinking puts the pressure on individuals to improve their work, rather than simply hoarding it until it is perfect.
Seth Godin discusses different types of feedback for writers and how to solicit feedback in a way that is most helpful. He also talks about how he personally prefers to receive feedback.
Seth Godin advises against showing your work to amateurs for feedback, as they will likely just give you logo advice. Developmental editors are priceless and you should find someone with that skill. After Permission Marketing, hearing people say back to him which parts of the book resonated with them taught him how to write the next book.
In this conversation, Tim Ferriss interviews Seth Godin about his new book, The Song of Significance. Godin talks about how the book is a manifesto for teams, and how it is focused on contribution and generosity. He also talks about how he is grateful for the opportunity to do this work, and how he hopes that people will take this message to heart and make things just a bit better in their own lives.
https://tim.blog/2023/05/17/seth-godin-2/
